Long Mac came over two skids at a time. The only man who was near enough to do anything was Skookum Charlie, but he feared Pete and had no mind for any trouble. He was safer on the top of the log. Ginger took a heavy spanner in his hand and went round the other end of the log. He was in time to see Pete rushing at Quin, who had nothing in his hands. Quin was the kind of man who wouldn't have, so much can be said for him.
Now Quin was standing at the opening of the great side chute, down which big cants and bents for bridge-work were thrown sideways. It was a forty-foot opening in the Mill's wall. It was smooth, greasy, sharply inclined. At the foot of it were some heavy eighteen-foot bents for bridge repairing.
"Ah," said Pete. It seemed to Quin that Pete came quick and that the other men who were running came very slow. Perhaps they did, for Pete was as quick on his feet as any cat or cougar. He weighed a hundred and fifty pounds of muscle and light bone. Quin weighed two hundred at the least. He wasn't quick till he was hot.
But Pete's quickness, though it caught Quin, yet saved him.
Had he been less quick Quin would have stopped his sharp downward pickareen. But Pete delivered his blow too soon. He aimed for Quin's head, but Quin dodged and the blow was a little short: instead of catching him inside the collar-bone and penetrating his lung, the steel point grazed the bone and came down like fire through the pectoral muscle. And Quin struck out with his right and caught Pete on the point of his left elbow. The Sitcum Siwash went back reeling and Ginger White flung his spanner at him. It missed him by a hair's breadth and Pete recovered. Before he could make another rush Mac was within a yard of him. But something passed Mac and struck Pete on the side of the head. It was an iron ring from an old roller. The philosopher Wong had flung it. Pete went over sideways, grabbed at nothing, lost his pickareen, caught his feet on the sill of the chute and pitched out headlong. He shot down the ways into the bents below and lay there quiet as a dead man.
"Are you hurt?" asked Ginger White. Quin's hand was to his breast.
"A bit," said Quin, as he breathed hard.
"It was a close call," said Ginger. The men stood round silently.
Skookum clambered down from the log. He was a dirty-whitish colour, for he wasn't brave.
"Pick that chap up," said Quin, "and see if he is hurt. If he is some of you can carry him up to the hospital."